


All You Had to Do...

by Raven_Ehtar



Series: Prompt Fills [5]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Cannibalism, Dark, Dark Loki (Marvel), Dubious Consent, FrostIron - Freeform, Kidnapping, M/M, Madness, Not Really Character Death, Pining Loki (Marvel), Soul Cannibalism, Unrequited Love, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000, technically
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-16
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2020-03-06 17:04:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18855307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raven_Ehtar/pseuds/Raven_Ehtar
Summary: ... was love me.





	All You Had to Do...

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jaxonkreide](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaxonkreide/gifts).



> Story number 16 for Story a Day May!
> 
> ... there was bound to be some heavy angst to balance out all the fluff this month, lol. This was a prompt given to me by [jaxonkreide](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaxonkreide) on the Frostiron Discord, who didn't want to write something this dark himself. Hope you enjoy, hon! ♥
> 
> Still working on writing and editing at a sprinting pace. If you spot any errors, feel free to point them out, I'll get them fixed when I have a chance! ♥

“All you had to do was love me…”

Anthony, bound as he was, refused to look alarmed by the whispered rebuke. It frustrated Loki just as much as it filled him with damnable pride, the clash of emotion making his heart twist in his chest until it stole his breath.

Anthony always stole his breath. It would have been so much simpler if he didn’t…

“Yeah, I don’t know about Asgardians, Bambi,” Anthony was saying, curling his hands into fists – testing, testing, testing, always testing his limitations, looking for a way out. “But humans don’t work that way. We don’t just fall in love with people because someone _claims_ to love us.”

He winced; the sting of the implication lancing through him in a way it wouldn’t have if it came from anyone else. He was often called a liar, a sneak, a manipulator. Often those things were at least partially true. But to have it thrown at him now, and here, by the one man he had felt as though he _ought_ to speak nothing but the truth…

… the one man he had felt the _desire_ to be honest with, and bare himself completely before his eyes…

And Anthony didn’t believe him. He thought all of Loki’s words of love and devotion, his pleads for his love to be reciprocated, or at the very least for Anthony to not reject him, to give it all _time_ and to just _think_ about it…

He rejected it all. He rejected _Loki_ , completely, and without any hesitation.

Loki had bared himself before this man, and he had still thought of him as nothing more than a liar.

Or he had looked, had seen his honesty and his feeling… and had still rejected him.

Loki stepped close to Tony, unable to ignore the way the man tensed as he did so, but not allowing it to stop him. He stroked his fingers down the side of Anthony’s face, and it was a testament to Anthony’s self-control that he didn’t pull away, however much he might have wished to.

“Human hearts,” he murmured, eyes skittering over Anthony’s face, a restless beetle unable to settle in any one place more than an instant. “What use have I of humans hearts?” he asked on a damp laugh. “None. None whatsoever. I desire only one heart. And it is not mine to have, it would seem.”

The look in Anthony’s eyes might have been any number of things, or some combination. Resentment lay in their amber depths, as did some measure of pity, and fear. None of them were what Loki would have wished to see when Anthony looked on him. No love, no admiration, not even a sliver of humor. All that lay there were the very antitheses of what he most wished to find.

There could be no humor where there was fear.

No admiration where there was pity.

No love where there was resentment.

Anthony didn’t love him. Just as before, Loki could love others, but was ever unworthy of the sentiment in return.

Anger and despair choked him. He cupped Anthony’s face in his hands, holding the one he desired so much in a grip which would never be allowed, which had to be _forced_ , and nearly sobbed at the small, guilty twist of satisfaction it gave him.

Unworthy of love, and he proved it more and more, with every choice he made.

He pressed his forehead to Anthony’s, eyes closed for a moment as he gathered himself. It felt as though he was breaking, his body cracking like ceramic. Soon he would shatter completely, and the poison inside him would drain away, and the Realms would be better for the loss.

“All you had to do… was _love_ _me_ …”

“… I know…”

Loki opened his eyes. Anthony was looking at him, he wasn’t turning away. He had always been one of the few who never turned away, who would look when no one else would. He’d thought that it might be enough…

But no. Anthony’s eyes were full of sorrow.

“I know, Lokes. And… for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I… I’m sorry that I couldn’t do that.”

The smile on his lips tasted bitter, a sharp counterpoint to the salt. “Did you even try?”

For a moment, he thought that Anthony might lie, might tell him that he _had_ tried and just couldn’t find it in him, that it wasn’t meant to be… But he shook his head, cheeks brushing against Loki’s palms. “I don’t think that it works like that, Lokes. Not for anyone.”

“Maybe not,” he murmured, stepping back. “But for all you have _not_ tried to love me, I have tried to _not_ love you…”

Anthony closed his eyes, the closest to a wince as he would allow himself.

“It seems we have both failed, and now there is an imbalance. You have my heart, Anthony, and I have not yours.”

The mortal shook his head, not looking at him, looking anywhere _but_ him. “I don’t know what to tell you. I can’t give back what I never intended to take.”

“No,” Loki agreed, and straightened his spine. “You cannot _give_ anything – either your own heart in return or mine back to me. So I think it would only be fair to _take_ something in return.”

Anthony’s head snapped up, alarm writ in every feature. Loki smiled at him, salt and bitterness still heavy on his tongue. “Don’t you think that would be fair, Anthony?”

He didn’t reply, but looked up at his hands, bound above his head in midair by magic, as though he hoped to somehow undo the binds which held him. It would be impossible, of course, but Loki would not put it past him to try.

“Lokes…” And Loki’s heart twisted again at that dichotomy of guilt and pleasure, hearing the alarm, the barely veiled _panic_ which threaded through Tony’s voice. “What are you planning, here? An eye for an eye kind of deal, but with… I mean you don’t really want mine at all, you know, it’s kind of shredded at this point. A damaged heart isn’t likely to do you much good.”

Loki laughed a watery laugh. “One damaged heart for another, Anthony. It seems perfectly fitting to me.”

Anthony went still, eyes frozen on Loki, the look of a man who had nothing they could do to stave off coming disaster, no plan, and was desperately seeking _something_.

Loki sighed. “I’m not about to cut out your beating heart, Anthony. I am not quite so unhinged.” He tilted his head at Anthony. “What good would it be to me, were you dead?”

It only seemed to reassure the man slightly. Loki could hardly blame him. “Okay. No live sacrifices, then. So what…” He swallowed. “What exactly did you have in mind?”

Rather than reply, Loki turned his attention inward, towards the magic which he had been allowing to brew and strengthen within him. It was ready, and so was he.

Raising a hand to his chest, he drew out the power, until it was a mass of ethereal blue light, clutched in his fingers. It burned slightly, different enough from his own natural magic that his body wanted to reject it, familiar enough that it wouldn’t do to him what it was intended to do to…

Closed the distance between him and Anthony again. This time he did draw away, pulling back as far as his bonds would allow to escape the blue-white orb Loki held in his hand.

“Lokes, Lokes! What the hell is that, what are you doing?”

Panic now, with no attempt to shield or hide it. And Loki’s damaged heart tore itself a little more. He smiled, and hoped that the cracks in him didn’t show too much.

“You took my heart, Anthony, and were unable to give yours in return. So I… am going to have to take something else from you.”

Anthony’s eyes flicked from the glowing orb up to Loki’s eyes, panic and pleading all there was to see. Loki smiled, unable to give anything more.

“All you had to do was love me.”

He pressed forward, the orb sinking into Anthony’s ribcage, through the arc reactor embedded in his chest, through bone and muscle and fluid, seeking something more, something deeper, something _essential_. Anthony gasped. To Loki it was a sting barely on the right side of a burn – to Anthony it would be like acid, eating its way through his body as it went deeper and deeper.

As the orb sank, Loki covered Anthony’s mouth with his own. It was their first kiss, if it could be called that, and it would be their only, as well.

The magic finished its work, Anthony’s body slowly relaxing. Carefully, moving slowly, Loki pulled back on the orb, withdrawing it from the frail mortal body.

It had changed color. No longer ethereal blue, it was an almost blinding, dancing gold.

Loki stared at it, transfixed for a good minute or two before he thought to look back at Anthony. He—his body had relaxed, the expression on his face slackening, his eyes staring ahead and down to the floor, where his head had angled. But he was breathing. His body was alive.

His body was alive, and in Loki’s hand—

Was his soul. Anthony’s soul, held in his hand, a trade for the heart which he had stolen.

Given his own way, he might have spent hours in examining it, but the magic which held the soul wouldn’t last forever. He had to finish what he’d begun.

Compacting the orb and the soul it held until it was the size of a large marble, Loki held it up in his fingers, the very image of it wavering before his eyes, the whole room beginning to shift and warp—

And swallowed it.

The soul orb sank within him, burning and freezing at once. Loki’s head swam with adrenaline and with _something else_ , something which was exploding in his body in soft bursts. Awareness and memory, perception and interpretation, none of which were his, but which he _felt_ and _experienced_ …

Anthony.

 _His_ Anthony, now.

Shivering at the new sensations working their way through him, Loki smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> You guys, there's _two_ related works to this one, now, and they're both continuations and I'm just kjdfghdflsdufh!
> 
> Jax's continuation somehow makes this beginning even sadder and darker, and Sal's goes _completely_ the other direction and makes it fluffy and lovely! I'm absolutely floored that these two talented and wonderful people put in the time to create a continuation for this thing, it's amazing. Go check them out! Jax even drew up some beautiful art for Sal's continuation, linked to her fic! ♥ ♥ ♥
> 
> \---
> 
> Thanks for reading, everyone!
> 
> You can find me on  
> Tumblr: [@ehtarwrites](http://ehtarwrites.tumblr.com/)  
> Twitter: [@ehtarwrites](https://twitter.com/ehtarwrites)  
> Discord: @ehtarwrites#4962 
> 
> If anyone wants to come say hi or chat about nerdy things, hmu! ♥

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Things We Do For Love](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18860965) by [jaxonkreide](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaxonkreide/pseuds/jaxonkreide)
  * [A Stain Upon My Soul](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19179148) by [SalamanderInk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SalamanderInk/pseuds/SalamanderInk)




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